Crazy Lady Manifesto

Everybody has bad days. Why not me?

Day before yesterday my rant centered on the price of candy. Yesterday it was a rant on how our school system, especially here in California is falling apart. And today I’m depressed about the fact that I am falling apart.

Me on a Bad Day!

Such a foul dark cloud is over my head as I write. Hope this post will have some clarity.   

Kids! Let me be an example of HOW NOT TO LIVE YOUR LIFE!  Who am I to give advice, you ask. Well, I am a late bloomer that’s who I am. Plus, I’m a real slow learner. 

Here we go… when I was young I gave up  my goal. Barbara Walters was big then. I was going to be her and know meet all the important people. I was going to uncover all the important news. 

But at 21 I got married and my goal changed to that of creating the perfect family. A noble goal. Just not always workable and often a bit of a pipe dream. Maybe I picked up my Mom’s goal.  

And you want to know something funny? I wasn’t able to attain that goal either. All I did was recreate the nightmare that was my childhood.

People with low self-esteem pick partners who are abusive, verbaly or physicially. Eventually they may get sick of it all and leave. But the truth is, unless they were tied and bound and shoved down the aisle, the choice was theirs to make.  

At 40, I found myself getting married for the third time. God! I swore I’d never do that.   The fiance was everything I never had. He listened when I talked. Told everyone how proud he was of me. Complimented me. Didn’t feel threatened that I had my own interests. Plus, he always put the toilet seat down.  Really, people were jealous of us!

Only Cost $1 Per Curl

    

In and out of bridal stores, I ranted, “I must be the oldest bride in captivity. I must be insane.”  I put this thought, and the other reacurring one that  “he MIGHT REALLY be too good to be true,”  right out of my head.  So I managed the trip down the aisle as the oldest bride with the longest hair in captivity.

Fifteen months pass and we have the regular ups and downs of any newlywed couple. How could I NOT have been wildly in love? The man built me a flower garden and pulled open the curtain for me to see. 

“Look honey,” he proclaimed, “a beautiful woman like  you should only look at beautiful things every day.”

Isn’t your heart just melting???  Well, stop it! Because it was all a ruse!

Get a Napkin!

Then it’s December 2001. The day was clear, no rain. Moderate temperatures. My daughter Marianne, was driving home when she had a freak accident. She was 18 and had learned her tough lessons. Her life was back on track with two jobs and her return to school. 

Marianne

She and I were finally enjoying the wonderful, close relationship we’d lost. I can never explain what it’s like to wake up every day with a lump in your throat and an  aching heart before you’re eyes are even fully open. How can a broken heart still beat?  I couldn’t eat a thing and people wouldn’t leave me alone. Chicken tasted like metal. Beef tasted like rubber. Who cared about food? My child was gone and I was right there on that same freeway right at that very moment. Shouldn’t I have known? Shouldn’t I have told her about my premonition a few days earlier? </p>

<p>The guilt I live with will never go away. And this is as it should be. I accept that. I accept it all. I can’t go back and be a good mother. I can only go on and try to be a good person; a person she would be proud to have as her mother.</p> <p>

You know, you tell your kids to put on their coats. Don’t run with scissors. Eat your vegetables. Don’t stand up in the tub. And you tell them that they could get hurt.</p><p>

But somehow you don’t believe it. You don’t believe that anything bad will ever happen to your child. You love them so much that your love will protect them forever. </p><p> 

 When this happened to my daughter, I couldn’t believe it. Everything is not in your control. </p><p>

To survive, I had to put myself in a fog like cocoon.  I didn’t talk, eat or speak for a few weeks. Maybe more. I sat and crocheted  from one corner of the couch.  I lost 25LBS and didn’t notice it.</p><p>

Since childhood, when I was nervous,  I would twist my hair into knots. So I knew that if I didn’t keep my hands busy, they’d fly up  and rip the hair from my scalp. </p><p>

Instead, I made afghans like a mad woman; one for everyone I knew,  who grieved along with me. Her dad, my mom, her boyfriend, his mother and my bestfriend, etc. Then one day, it dawned on me that I was being very selfish in my grief. I neglected to ask my husband, her stepdad how he was doing.   </p><p>

“Fine,” he answered flatly.</p><p>

How could that be? We both lived with her. We saw her everyday. She was a big part of our lives and suddenly she was gone. </p><p>

“Maybe it will help us both if we talk about her.” I said.</p><p>

“Oh, no. I didn’t know her,”  he said. “so I don’t feel anything.”</p><p>

Hmmm…he knew her. Three years before, when I was worried about her staying out all night he told me she would grow out of it. I worried too much, he said. And he was right.  She turned it all around.</p><p>

He used to bitch and complain if she left a light on or didn’t close the toothpaste cap. He knews  her then.    </p><p>

I assumed that he was in shock and would later talk. So I didn’t bring up the subject for six more months. And when I did, I got the same answer.   </p><p>

Suddenly he started to look different to me. He was flirting with the grocery checkers. He didn’t seem so easy to please anymore. And  I don’t think it was only due to the fact that he changed. I think there were things that I didn’t see because I was blind. </p><p>

Soon, I was facing the fact that he was a heartless B*ST*RD and maybe even a sociopath.  Talk about going crazy! Imagine discovering that you don’t even know the person you married. One day they’re comforting your grief, and he actually said this: ”Worse things have happened to other people. Stop crying.”
 </p> <p>

This was when I knew it was over. I just waited for the day I felt strong enough to grieve in divorce court.  That day came when he revealed  something from his past. Before we met, he’d caused a car accident and was still paying for it.  .</p><p>

“Oh, yeh” he said. “I was always getting in hit and runs. And I figured it was the cops’ fault. They could never catch me.”

Wait a minute! His inability to grieve was not due to the fact that he was in shock or just too macho. No, he wasn’t grieving because inside he was nothing. No feelings. NADA! Another Scott Peterson.  

  
Chills went down my spine at the realization. Sociopaths act sweet and kind and loving until they desire nothing from you and then they act like you are dead. Before I could get my mental health together, he skipped town for another woman.  Didn’t pack a suitcase and didn’t look back. Rumor had it, the break up was my fault because I wasn’t “fun anymore.” </p><p>

I couldn’t stop crying to get a job. And when I did, even Taco Bell wasn’t hiring. A year goes by and he’s at my door crying: the girlfriend was a liar. Imagine that! <p></p>

My brain was so messed up. Cry every day for two years and see how “with it” you feel. I took him back.  Facing the fact that the man I thought was warm and caring was a big, fat, empty fake, was difficult. Another year goes by and I did kick him out. I couldn’t pretend I was the happy, hopeful  wife. The sight of him turned my stomach.<p></p>

 

Now this is not a plea for sympathy. I want to explain how I got to be the new and much improved ME.   And finally…IT DOES NOT INVOLVE A MAN!

Shut up!

Don’t call me a man hater. The combination of me and a man is bad. Every time I get involved, the new man is worse than the last man. Talk about a life saving lesson!  All the happiness I get today is  from me. My 2005 divorce  was my easiest. I’ve been single ever since. I have no time at all for dating. Just the way I like it!<p></p>

  Happiness is because of who I am, what type of person I choose to be and what I choose to do for myself.  Of course, my Mom and Britt help too!

I went back to school to do something for myself and Britt. <p></p>

I want to start my newspaper to do something good for family and for my community.  I love to share my passion of writing. <p></p>

 

Writing, learning, growing and meeting people is my passion. <p></p>

Getting the paper off the ground without the proper resources is very tough and sometimes depressing. I’m a freelancer who writes for a “per word” fee. Not a lot of capital there to go into business, even if it is a very, very worthy business. <p></P> 

And while I spent all those years crying and taking care of my family, I failed to notice that my health was slipping. So today I feel like I am playing Beat The Clock. <p></p>

Cuckoo!

 I want to cover all the “peope” news that the mainstream corporate news does not bother with.  People deserve more.  It doesn’t even make sense that I’d try to do this. But it’s what I want to do. <p></p>

And WHEN has my life ever made sense anyway???The way I see it, I have nothing left to lose.    

 

Glutton for Punishment: Does SJ Need Another Paper?

Kids Enjoying a Summer Day

My answer, is a resounding “Yes!”

Newspaper readership started its downward spiral  in the 1980s and continues  at a crazy pace today. 

Ok, so the Internet is partly to blame. But I don’t think this paints the whole picture.  Instead of embracing the online frontier as exciting and fresh, the powers that be have lived in dread and ignorance.

Newspapers have always naturally dated themselves.  A daily is only new and useful until the the next issue is distributed the next day.  Take yesterday’s issue and shove it under your bird cage! Who needs it?  Tomorrow you will be presented with brand new news.

The Internet holds the answers. Think of it as a  much-needed mouth to mouth recessitation with a limitless breathe of fresh possibilities. Old dinosaur media is failing fast. Nothing  less than thinking outside the box will save it.     

Now I’m not about to relinquish the ideas that have rattled around in my  head for the past two years. But sometimes the new girl on the block does  comes up with a winner.

I can hear you loud and clear, “You must be insane! You propose to    publish a paper in a city of 940,000 people that is already saturated by a conglomerate!”

Let’s not forget the two smaller organizations: Media News and Silicon Valley Community News  that publish at minimum, a combination of 16 papers.

Ok. I’m a hard head. A glutton for punishment. But I love to write, been doing it in one form or another for 30 years. And I’m tired of complaining so I’ll take up the challenge and see what happens. 

People constantly complain about the media. I join in their disappontment when I pick up a paper, a shrinking paper. Shrinking in size and span of valuable information.  It seems that the original purpose has gone out the window: to inform citizens. The add-on purpose of ”entertainment” which supplies all  the gossip and Hollywood news isn’t increasing readership either. No slam to Hollywood, but we can feed our curiosity with  Cable TV and magazines.

It seems increasingly that the mission of newspapers is to guard their bottom dollar. 

Of course, this is a business that needs to make money. But it seems that the original intent of informing the public has been completely replaced with the need to please multi-million dollar advertisers and stockholders.

Sadly, the only group that gets served by newspapers is the CEOs who draw bonuses for failure. When a paper runs into trouble and needs to cut expenses, the first thing to go is the reporters.

Certainly, something else can go. Oh, I don’t know…….for instance…maybe the BONUSES!   Ten Jaguars,  four summer homes and six yachts will have to do! Scale back on the luxuries Mr. and Mrs. Summer-In-the-Hamptons!

Let me run a hair styling shop. I’ll open up with one stylist and 12 auto mechanics.  Maybe I’ll throw in a palm reader because she works cheap and mops the floor for free. And how about if I let my neighbor set up a table to sell pot holders.  How many customers looking for hair cuts will be happy with my shop? Not many.   

Maybe newspapers need to return to the base it was founded for: the people. What about school news?  We cut our school funding each year but we don’t hear all that schools are doing or not doing.  How do teachers deal? We ask them to do more with less.

If you need your car washed you could help out a school. But first you need to know where to take your car. Have junk to sell? Maybe your neighborhood learning institution is holding a flea market. Not very sexy, but you might like to know these things.

Do you have lots of extra time on your hands? Would you like to feel useful? So would many other people, only they don’t know where to sign-up.    

Whew! I’m all ranted out. Mais amanha.

San Jose Independent News – Celebrating a Community of People

 

While I’m overextending myself…

Ok, so the mice who’ve been following my saga know that I’m going to school for my English/Journalism degree. I am a returning student which really is a challenge. Once you reach 40 you realize that you never fully appreciated the brain cells you had 20 years ago. 

Because my life is not challenging enough, I came up with a new goal the other day. For the past six months I’ve though about how great it would be to start my own community newspaper. Since I don’t have time; there’s a Mom and daughter to shuffle around town,  the matter seemed put to bed. 

One day last week I woke up, like I do every morning. And it hit me. I will never be happy unless  I publish a newspaper! Somebody hit me please!

This Fall I will be the editor of my college paper. Let’s not forget that I am also, the Communications Director of the Fashion, Design and Apparel Technology Club (also at the college).  And Mom and my daughter still need shuttling around town.        

I’ve been taking notes and figuring out how I will set up the paper. Not to mention inquiring about people I’d like to interview.

Now I’m looking for someone to help set up the internet version of the paper. There will also be a small inprint run.  Let you know more tomorrow.

 

Benefits of the Fringe Kind

Ok, so if you’ve been following along, you’ve read my recent post where I gave the bad news that reporting does not pay well unless you’re on a large paper and possess the wit to engage in investigative reporting. 

What’s investigative reporting? Well, it’s an activity that involves, what my Journalism Advisor Robert Funk used to call, “shoe leather.” The internet may sadly have ruined all that.

Ok, say that by the end of the evening, exit polls of a presidential election indicate overwhelming that Candidate “A” is out ahead by 30%. Everyone goes to sleep and in the morning they  are shocked to find that Candiate “B” won the race by 40%.

Such a large discrepancy would make an inspired journalist itch to get going.  Big stories can involve dozens of interviews, dozens of leads that need pursuing and could require writing a story each day for weeks until each stone is turned and the entire story is known. 

This is the work that takes gumption and a quisitive mind that does not get bored or side-tracked easily!

Years ago when I started in Journalism, I was moved by Bob Woodward.  Today I am a feature writer on a small community newspaper.  Small papers make their money from ads usually and don’t have the big money to pay. Translation: Get the perks wherever you can!

The favorite perk of my job is that I meet some really neat people.  One example is Raymond Wu, owner of Nelson’s Green Dry Cleaners on Washington Street.   Raymond loves his business and is very personable. 

My photographer and I have been invited to his annual Chinese New Years party this month.

Another example is sweet lady I met at one of the summer concerts at Central Park.  We sat together and got to talking. This lady is such a dear! We’ve ran into othe half a dozen times. She and her husband like to get out  and have fun.

“I clip all of your stories out of the paper,” she tells me.  Are you listening Mom?  I think I found my Fan Club President. 

Now that’s what I call perks!